


Initiation Sigh

by jesterlady



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Crack, F/M, Gen, Humor, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-02
Updated: 2011-10-02
Packaged: 2017-10-24 06:28:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/260153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jesterlady/pseuds/jesterlady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is my way of making fun of my own tendency to overuse sighing in my writing and to include someone in the Scoobies who should be there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Initiation Sigh

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Alongside World](https://archiveofourown.org/works/258976) by [jesterlady](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jesterlady/pseuds/jesterlady). 



> Disclaimer: I don't own BTVS. Also, this is crack.

“D-don’t, don’t you t-think that it was a c-cry for h-h-help?” Tara asked hesitantly, as usual. Buffy sighed. Action and go were her mottos and stuttering certainly didn’t help either one of them. But she guessed she’d better start placating her troops or morale might start to go down. She’d heard that somewhere.

“What are you trying to get at, Tara?” she asked, pulling out her newest sword and giving it a cursory examination, cursing when she saw a  
small speck on the hilt. “Wait! Hold that thought,” she shouted when Tara once more tried to haltingly make her point. “There’s a speck.”

Now Tara sighed. There was no getting around speck cleaning; even she knew that by now.

“I-I’ll just, just go t-then,” she said, turning away. Buffy, completely engrossed in her speck, didn’t even look up.

Tara made her way over to Spike’s crypt where she knew he would just be waking up after a long night of violence and blood. She hoped  
he’d had enough to make him not cranky and maybe even use only one ‘bloody hell’ instead of twenty.

“Well, little witch.” Spike raised one eyebrow as she caught him in the process of pulling on a shirt, lighting a cigarette and  
sprinkling Wheatabix into a mug of blood, all at once. “Someone’s in a flush today.”

Tara blushed. Spike sighed, thinking it must have been at least her four hundredth of the day so far, but he supposed it was early yet.

“H-hello, Spike,” she started off; proud of only one stutter so far.

“Hello yourself. Got anything tasty in, I mean, on you?” He gave her a suggestive leer. Tara sighed. Spike was obviously in a ‘be  
gross first, think later’ mode. But she was here so she might as well try.

“I-I had a q-question for you. I t-tried to t-talk to Buffy, but she f-found a s-speck-”

“Say no more, pet,” Spike interrupted. “I’d better go help her with that! She might not be able to handle it herself.”

“She can handle a speck, Spike!” came a new voice from the door. “You’ve just got other handling on your mind, you undead creep!”  
Spike turned to face the door and with a bored look on his face welcomed Xander into his very humble abode.

“What the bloody hell do you want, runt?” he asked shortly. “Got things to do.”

“I want you to stay the hell away from Buffy,” Xander told him. “Vampires are evil, dead, soulless things and the less Buffy knows  
them the better.”

“Then she should get a different job,” Spike pointed out. “Whoops, nope, destiny. Guess you’ll just have to come up with a new  
sodding excuse.”

“Buffy can’t see you for what you really are,” Xander returned. “But I can and I will do something about it if you aren’t careful!”

“Whatcha gonna do, carpenter? Nail me a coffin?”

“X-xander?” Tara said so softly that neither heard her. She tried again amidst their bandying words. And again. And again. The  
fifth time, something penetrated their testosterone war and both turned to look at her.

“What is it, Tara?” Xander asked, sighing. “Who is Willow’s girlfriend. Who I know all about. Who is not surprising to me or  
threatening at all.” Spike just looked at him and wondered why the boy hadn’t died years ago.

“D-do you think m-maybe that the spell t-that-”

“Spell!” Xander shouted. “Willow needs help with a spell! I shall go to her faster than a Klingon battle cruiser!” Xander started  
out, but stopped at the entrance with a warning to the other two. “I did not just say that.”

Tara sighed and left herself while Spike flopped down in front of the television and started arguing with it.

On her way home in exasperation, Tara ran into Giles who came out of the library with a mountain of books in one hand and a bottle of  
scotch in the other.

“C-can I h-help you?” she asked politely, shifting from one foot to the other.

“Nonsense, I’m quite capable,” Giles answered just as the book mountain wobbled and then toppled. “Perhaps a hand or two,” he said,  
looking down at the books in horror as they landed on the dirty ground; thankfully, the scotch was all right.

Tara helped Giles pick up the books and they walked back to his apartment.

“I-I have a p-problem,” Tara told him. “I-I want to know w-what you think.”

“Well, naturally, I must consult my books at once,” Giles said, rummaging around in the pile before pulling out the mustiest of them  
all. “Ah yes, this will be quite helpful, I imagine. I do believe I found a similar case in here before.”

“D-don’t you even w-want to know w-what it is?” Tara asked incredulously. Giles sighed.

“My dear girl, I have quite a large brain and a lot of training and I think I can figure it all out before the killing starts. Never  
you mind and thank you for bringing it to my attention.” Giles dived into the book and by the glazed look in his eyes, Tara knew he wouldn’t  
be coming up for air anytime soon. She sighed and continued on her way home, but decided to stop at the Magic Box before she did so.

Anya was inside making a customer buy things through the power of sheer annoyance.

“We have a sale next week - you know, the times when we put lower prices on items so that people will be fooled into buying more  
thinking they are paying less,” Anya announced to Tara with glee in greeting.

“H-how w-wonderful,” Tara answered.

“Are you going to buy something?” Anya asked eagerly.

“N-no,” Tara replied. “I-I just-“

“Oh,” Anya’s face fell and she sighed heavily. “Well, then I require your standing space for paying customers, so unless it has  
something to do with Xander?”

“No, it d-doesn’t,” Tara said with a sigh as she left. Anya waved cheerfully at her departing back and offered a,

“May your money be blessed,” on the way out.

Tara had only walked a few steps outside the door when she ran into Dawn who came up to her anxiously.

“Tara! You’re not leaving, are you? You’re never around. I wish you would stay; whoops, I promised I wouldn’t say that anymore. But  
I mean it, you should stay. Buffy never has time anymore.” Dawn sighed dramatically. “Once she gets into speck mode, you can never tell when  
she’ll come out of it. And Spike only spends his time standing beneath our tree and watching her window. Xander spends all his time trying to  
make Spike leave and Giles’ life is all about his books, you know? As for Willow, well, let’s not talk about the magic. I just want to tell  
her to GET OUT sometimes once she starts floating pencils and whatnot. Oh, sorry, you’re close and I don’t like it when you fight, so I  
shouldn’t be telling you these things and, oh look, there’s that girl from my school, I’m going to go and see her. Okay, bye, Tara. Don’t go  
anywhere.”

Tara took a deep breath and sighed as she walked back to her dorm room. Willow was there, true to Dawn’s word, floating pencils around  
her head in intricate patterns.

“Hi!” she crowed upon the sight of Tara. “Look what I can do! Aren’t I the keenest witch ever? I’m glad you’re here now and I can  
have you all to myself.”

Tara sighed, but sat down.

“I-I have had a f-frustrating d-day.”

“Really?” Willow put on resolve face in full force. “I could fix it. What’s the problem? Exams, studying, sore feet? I can do it,  
anything.”

“N-not magic f-fixable,” Tara told her firmly despite the stuttering. Willow just shook her head.

“Magic can fix anything. That’s what I always do. What’s the problem?” Willow leaned forward eagerly as Tara began her tale.

“I-I want to h-help someone. I-I think we a-all can, b-but I-I have to t-tell everyone, and t-they w-won’t l-listen,” Tara blurted out.

Willow sighed in concentration.

“Well, I have to think about it, but a general command spell should work well in this case.”

“N-no,” Tara tried to say, but Willow was off in Magical Control Land and Tara knew how much she loved her visits there. Tara left  
again in frustration, leaving Willow babbling on about possibilities. Tara knew she had to do what must be done, since no one else knew. She  
was their only hope.

 

***

The next day all the Scoobies were assembled at Buffy’s house. Buffy was proudly displaying last night’s kill, careless of the head dripping on the carpet. Spike lounged against the doorway and sent her signals with his eyes and snarked at her with his lips. Xander ranted on about Spike’s presence while Anya leaned on his arm and tried to show him the Magic Box’s receipts to distract him. Willow sat on the couch and told everyone about her latest exam score while Dawn had a quiet tantrum on the floor because nobody was paying attention to her. Giles told her to shush because he was at the most crucial point of his book.

Tara arrived, dragging her conquest behind her and presented him to the group. At first no one paid attention, but then Spike, who noticed and  
must have been able to read the stutters coming from Tara’s lips, gave a long whistle which sent everyone into silence.

“H-he needs our help. The s-spell was a c-cry for h-help. H-he should be i-included. We can m-make sure he doesn’t t-try a-again. W-what do  
y-you all s-say?”

“I’m in charge here,” Buffy said importantly. “I’m all about protecting the weak and little people; but honestly, Tara, I’m not trying to  
qualify for sainthood.”

“Yeah, they’d never bloody well let you in,” Spike muttered. Buffy sighed, glared at him, and punched him in the nose.

“Bloody hell, Slayer!” he yelped. “I mean you’re wonderful and delicious and all a man could ever want.” Buffy nodded, satisfied. Xander  
sighed and started to whine about Spike not actually being a man when a sound caused them all to start and look up.

It was a small sigh of nervousness. But they all caught it. Grins formed on every face and they all began clapping Jonathan on the back and  
welcoming him into the Scoobies. Tara smiled, her job complete, as the boy who wanted to belong became a part, using what had been in him all  
along. She allowed herself a small sigh of satisfaction as she murmured to herself without one single stutter.

“There’s a sigh in all of us.”


End file.
